Delegates
get PEF primer on
‘How
to stop privatization dead in its tracks’
By SHERRY HALBROOK
Do you know which of the people at your worksite are
state employees and which ones are private consultants or
contractors? In many state agencies you really can’t
tell the players without a score card.
So, why should you bother to keep score? Because your own
job may be at stake.
Because most state employees are hired and promoted based
on competitive exams and uniform standards of merit and
fitness, while contractors and consultants may be hired
because they are the lowest bidders or for other more
subjective reasons.
Because the lowest bidder may still cost taxpayers a lot
more than state employees.
And because public employees give New Yorkers maximum
control over public services and the greatest
accountability.
With those important considerations in mind, hundreds of
delegates to PEF’s 2003 convention in September
crowded into a workshop on how to find out when state
services are being handed off to the private sector, and
how to fight it.
PEF needs your help
PEF Director of Civil Service Enforcement Tom Cetrino,
who taught the workshop with Legislative Director Brian
Curran, began with the basics.
“As part of PEF’s massive Cut State Waste, Not
State Workers campaign, we need your help identifying
privatization at your agency or worksite, so we can
protect your job and preserve state services,”
Cetrino said.
“You know it’s privatization when the state
gives the private sector responsibility for delivering
services that were once delivered by state
employees.”
This can take the form of contracting out with private
companies, organizations or individuals to provide the
services, or directly funding the private provision of
the services.
Sometimes the switch from state to private is almost too
quick and slick to be seen.
“There has been a net loss of 20 information
technology PEF positions to contractors since 1979, but
we lost the opportunity for the creation of hundreds of
new PEF-represented jobs,” Cetrino said.
“Your job may not be threatened now, but it will be
threatened in the future,” he said.
“Many people believe that cutting the state
workforce and hiring private contractors saves the public
money, but that is almost never true. The state is facing
a huge budget deficit next year, and we need to come up
with better ways for the state to save money and raise
revenues. Even if the state fired every one of its
employees, that would save only about $2 billion of the
$12 billion deficit.”
One very important way to help the state save money is to
expose how the supposed cost savings of privatization and
contracting out are bogus, he said.
“We need your help to expose how graft, fraud in the
awarding or implementation of contracts, shoddy work by
contractors and cost overruns outweigh any perceived
savings,” Cetrino added.
“We have to make politicians feel they will lose too
many votes by being loyal to contractors.
“And we need to convince state managers they lose
control when they contract work out to the private
sector. There is no written policy requiring the state to
contract out. Managers usually do it whenever possible,
because they believe it’s what the governor wants
and it’s what the state Division of Budget
wants,” Cetrino said.
“If they say they are doing it to avoid layoffs,
that’s baloney,” he added. “The fact is,
the more they contract out, the higher the probability of
layoffs.”
You need PEF’s help
If you suspect problems with contractors, you should
notify Cetrino’s department and provide the
contractor’s name and dates and other details about
contracts, correspondence, reports, memos or e-mails that
may be available to PEF under the Freedom of Information
Law (FOIL).
“Correspondence is a gray area, but we have to try
to get it, even if that means going to court,”
Cetrino said.
“We need hard documentation to back up what we know,
but you don’t have to do everything on your own. Get
as much information as you can and then go to your
steward, council leader or PEF field rep. PEF can check a
database at the Office of the State Comptroller of all
state contracts with identifying numbers that expedite
FOIL requests.”
PEF can also access a New York City registry that
provides information on contractor performance. And other
unions may share information they have gathered about
contractors they have come up against in other locations.
PEF will help you do the cost analysis and number
crunching to make your case for doing the work in-house.
Accurate cost analysis and comparisons can be the
linchpin in a successful successful effort to stop
contracting out.
“We have to include fringe benefits, which are
usually 35 percent to 40 percent on top of state employee
pay, plus equipment and other indirect costs when we
estimate what it would cost to do the work
in-house,” Cetrino said.
“And we would shortchange ourselves if we assumed
the state’s only cost for contracting out is the
total cost listed in the contract. We need to add in such
things as monitoring the contract, space the state pays
for and other indirect costs.
“Just proving we are more cost-effective than the
contractor won’t win our argument, but it is a very
important part of our argument,” Cetrino told the
delegates. “After a contract has been awarded, we
have to focus on poor service, too.”
Get organized, informed
The first step you must take to fight contracting out is
to organize a core group of committed members who have
knowledge about the services being contracted out and
access to information about how the contract is being
implemented.
“There is no quick fix. It takes time to gather
accurate information and organize a good campaign,”
Cetrino said. “So, the sooner you start, the sooner
you can get results.”
If your agency hasn’t awarded a contract yet, so
much the better.
Get your PEF labor-management chair to ask management for
a copy of the request for proposals (RFP) or draft RFP if
it hasn’t been issued yet.
Find out whose idea it was to contract out the work, how
much is it likely to cost and how does that compare to
the cost of doing the work in-house with state employees.
Ask what guarantee the state will have that the quality
of services will be maintained.
Learn as much as possible about what services are being
contracted out and why.
Ask managers in writing for any information they used in
deciding to contract for the work. It’s important to
get your questions and the answers you receive on the
record.
If managers don’t respond to your requests, that can
be used by PEF in other strategies.
Find out exactly what services the contractor expects to
provide and under what circumstances and conditions.
The more accurate and exact the answers you get to these
questions, the better your chances of building an
effective campaign against contracting out.
“Management may be the only source for information
before a contract is awarded,” Cetrino said.
“If your managers are looking to contract out
because of a directive from above, PEF may have to FOIL
the information, which is more difficult and
time-consuming.”
If the contract has already been awarded, identify the
people who work for the contractor and find out what
their qualifications are for the work they are doing.
Identify who, if anyone, is monitoring the
contractor’s performance and get copies of any
reports or correspondence, or at least get the dates they
were issued.
Get mobilized
When as much of this information as possible has been
gathered and the cost analysis and comparisons
calculated, it has to be presented effectively to an
audience that has the power to stop the contracting out.
That could be agency management, the state Legislature,
the governor’s office or the public.
PEF’s field services, civil service enforcement,
legislative, mobilization and public relations
departments will all be there to help you pick your
targets, frame your message and orchestrate an effective
campaign.
You also may need to build coalitions with other
concerned groups, such as client advocates, to intensify
and broaden your attack.
You must convince your audience, no matter who it is,
that it will be better off if the work is done in-house.
So, the issues of quality, cost and public opinion are
very important.
It can be done
State legislators are among the people PEF has been most
successful in convincing by these arguments.
As PEF’s legislative director, Curran said he works
with the union’s political activists to educate the
lawmakers about state services and the importance of
maintaining their quality through proper funding and
accountability.
Curran said he also works to get laws enacted that would
impose better controls on contracting out, however, these
efforts sometimes pass the Legislature but fail to get
the governor’s signature.
But even the toughest audience can be convinced by the
right arguments, Curran told the delegates.
“Our members at the state Office of Mental
Retardation and Developmental Disabilities analyzed the
cost of contracting out electronic data processing,”
Curran said, “and showed it would cost their agency
more than doing the work in house.
“Management said, ‘No, we still have to
contract it out because the state hiring freeze prevents
us from having enough employees to do the work.’
“We took our case all the way to the governor’s
office and finally got it and the Division of Budget to
agree we were right,” Curran said. “They lifted
the hiring freeze and OMRDD hired 20 more state
workers.”
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